Stay
by Viva La Vostra Vita
Summary: Draco's gone. That leaves Hermione with a choice.


A/N: Okay, this is my first fic. so I don't really know how good it is. Anyway, kinda dark, but not too bad, I don't think. R&R

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**Per Sempre**

'Do you understand, now, that you really have nothing to be depressed about? Miss Granger, suicide is never the answer. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

The councelors' voice drifted around the room and I heard her, without truly hearing her. I had tuned out the meaning of her words - they meant nothing anyway, they were exactly what I had expected - so I was just hearing noise. Meaningless sounds.

I fingered the raised cuts on my wrists. Nothing had meaning anymore. Not since . . . Then.

Two days after he . . . left, I had slit wrists. With him gone, I had no will to keep on living. It had started nearly a three weeks before, when he disappeared. Somehow, I knew that even if he was found, he was still lost. He would not stay. And I was right.

They found him the next day, broken and bleeding in the forest behind the manor. I don't remember much of the next day or so. Most of what I do remember are simply tear blurred images of Draco lying bruised and beaten on that sterile hospital bed. Some memories, however, were crystal clear.

_He had been found by a muggle and transported to a muggle hospital. If I had been thinking clearly, I would have found a way to get him to St. Mungo's. As it was, I was of absolutely no use - to him or even myself._

_I guess Harry or Ron had finally told somebody about his father while we were missing, because I don't remember seeing him around, though I remember thinking that even if Lucius hadn't been the one to do this to him, it was almost guarenteed that he wouldn't set foot in this hospital. _

_Draco was awake for a while towards the end, and I was the only one in the room when I saw his eyes flutter open. It was then that the guilt washed over me. If I had found a way to get him somewhere they could help him, if I had just told Harry or Ron where I was, he wouldn't be like this. He would live._

_Immediatly, I could tell that there was something wrong, something missing in his hypnotic grey eyes. But he smiled at me, and my heart broke. This was my fault, if I had just told someone . . . I wanted so badly to hold him, but the tubes and wires and his own broken bones stopped me. Then he began to speak._

_I don't remember all of what he said to me, but he told me not to blame myself - as if I couldn't - that he didn't blame me. He talked about forever, what it meant to him and where I thought we went when we died.. I think it was his way of saying goodbye, though I tried very hard not to realize this at the time. Maybe he was looking for comfort, some assurance that he wasn't condemned to the same hell that his father was. If there was a heaven, one that included Draco was the only kind I could apprieciate. He told me he loved me and his eyes began to dim at the light left them. _

_I kissed him for the final time - I couldn't stop myself, I had to taste him one last time. When his eyes shut, I knew I would never see that brilliant blue again in my lifetime. He was gone in under an hour._

_I barely made it through the funeral. The things the speaker said were almost an insult to his memory. The words were all about what Draco had been, but they could never do him justice. They could never capture exactly who he was. I knew that my friends were around me, holding me, crying with me, but I had never felt so alone in my life. _

_That was the night I tried to end it all, at the home where I'd grown up. I'd hoped that by surrounding myself with Muggles, they wouldn't be able to save me. I hadn't taken into account that Harry had grown up in this world. The brilliant Hermione Granger was finally losing her mind. Harry must have been expecting me to do something of the sort, because I heard the screaming of sirens before I blacked out. I woke up here. _

_At least Harry'd honored by request, by not sending back to the magical world. Somehow, I'd turned my back on it. That had been the world we all shared, and with him gone, it simply wasn't the same. I couldn't take it anymore._

_I haven't told my 'therapist' any of this. She wouldn't, couldn't, understand. To her, Draco is just another, average boy. An everyday story with a tragic ending. But she's wrong. Draco was never anything close to average. _

_He was freedom and hope and love. He was strength and pain and death. He was a beautiful, wonderful disaster. She wouldn't understand. And it wasn't as if I could bring Hogwarts into the story. I'd be locked in a padded cell before I knew what was happening._

'Hermione? Miss Granger, I asked you a question. Do you understand me?' I pulled myself back to this ugly room and this ugly time. I was required to answer this pointless question. I used to love answering questions, I'd always had the answer. This one was simple - did I understand? No. I nodded mutely. I just wanted this to be over. I wanted it all to be over.

Later that night, I sat alone in my room, turning the sharp piece of metal over and over in my fingers. I was saying my silent goodbyes. There would be no need to explain this to them. They would understand, though I left them a letter clarifying it all just in case. I was not afraid.

But I was . . . worried, not for myself, but for them. Who would take care of Harry? I knew Ginny was trying, but there were things he would never tell anybody, and she didn't know how to just be there yet. And who would be there to calm Ron down before he did something stupid? Luna was learning, but she was to spacey at times to be of any use. Would she be able to deal with his fierce temper? Both Harry and I had struggled with it, and we'd known him for years.

It didn't matter now. They would have to learn to take care of each other, because I couldn't do it anymore.

I held the blade up to the light, twisting it, so that the sharp edges refracted the light in a kalidascope of colors. I could almost hear his voice, but I couldn't. Not yet, but soon, so soon.

I pressed the cool metal to my wrist, pulling and digging. I smiled at the sharp burning pain, as the rusty, metalic scent of my blood filled my nose.

_'Mione' _My smile widened. _Draco._ I was coming home. The room blurred around me as I slipped sideways, my strength fading fast. Black spots appeared, but there was light, hope. I could almost see his beautiful face. Distantly, I could hear frantic voices around me, it was the nurses set to prevent the patients from doing something like this.

The voices around me grew ever fainter. They were going to try to save me, but they were too late. I was almost home. The light grew brighter, crowding everything else out. If I had been able to, I would have snickered. The light, head toward to the light, how very cliche. But then that thought was driven from my mind, as was everything else, by the appearence of a figure in front of me. _Draco._

_'Welcome home Angel.'_

**L'estremita**

_Fix You - Coldplay_

_'And the tears come streaming down your face,_

_When you lose something you can't replace._

_When you love someone but it goes to waste,_

_Could it be worse?_

_Lights will guide you home,_

_And ignite your bones_

_And I will try to fix you_

_And high up above or down below,_

_When you're too in love to let it go..._

_Lights will guide you home _

_And ignite your bones_

_And I will try to fix you.'_

La conclusione di tutte le cose - The end of all things.

Per sempre - Forever...

L'estremita - The End


End file.
